


The Sweetest Winds

by thornfield_girl



Series: Somehow, Someday [1]
Category: Justified
Genre: Complete, First Kiss, First Time, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-07
Updated: 2011-11-10
Packaged: 2017-10-25 19:47:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 15,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/274070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thornfield_girl/pseuds/thornfield_girl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Raylan and Boyd's relationship, starting with their first kiss and ending with a happyish ending (relatively speaking) after Bloody Harlan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. And the Dark Can Take You Down, and Love Can Mend Your Heart

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own Justified or make a profit from the characters. I love these characters and I'm just having fun playing with them.

Boyd stumbled out the front door of his daddy’s house and limped over to his beat up old pickup. His daddy had told him to g’on and get out, and he didn’t want to see Boyd back in the house that night, and Boyd had no problem with that. At that moment, he’d have been happy never to see Bo again for the rest of his life. Boyd hadn’t been beaten that bad in years, but his daddy was in rare form tonight. Boyd hadn’t resisted much, even though he was a fierce fighter despite his skinny build, and could probably – maybe – give big Bo Crowder something to think about, if he chose to. But Boyd was a pragmatist at heart, and he knew that if he could take it, he would take it. And Boyd could take a lot, you could say he’d built up an immunity to Bo’s fists and his belt over the years.

Boyd pulled out of the yard and didn’t have to think for a second where to go. He didn’t really know what Raylan could do for him, but he did know there wasn’t anyone else he wanted to see. He headed straight for the Givens house, and pulled up in the road just short of their drive. He killed the lights and walked up the gravel drive – he knew Arlo didn’t like him hanging around, and Boyd wasn’t looking for more trouble from anyone’s daddy right now. Arlo’s truck wasn’t in the drive, and Boyd saw a light on in a second floor bedroom, so he knocked on the front door. Raylan opened it with a big grin on his face, which quickly faded as he took in Boyd’s injuries.

“Goddamn it, Boyd. Bo do this?”

“Yeah, he did. Can I come in?”

Raylan grimaced and said, “Shit. I wish you could, but Arlo and my momma are going to be home any minute from Helen’s. He ain’t going to be in any mood to see you hanging around and bleeding on the furniture.” He thought for a moment and said, “Wait for me in the truck, I’ll be right out.”

Boyd walked down to his truck with some relief, feeling like he’d made the right choice. Raylan apparently had a plan – Raylan could help. A few minutes later, Raylan came out of his house carrying a duffel bag, a familiar-looking jar of clear liquid and a rolled up blanket. He threw the bag and the blanket in the truck bed and climbed into the passenger seat with the jar of Arlo’s moonshine. Raylan unscrewed the cap, took a pull and handed it over to Boyd.

“Raylan Givens, you are a friend indeed,” he drawled, and took a good-sized gulp from the jar before handing it back.

“Let’s head out to the lake, get you cleaned up.”

Boyd started driving, and he could see Raylan glancing over at him periodically, and could hear the occasional frustrated sigh from his side of the cab.

“Got something to say, Raylan?”

“I got plenty to say, but this probably ain’t the best time for it.”  


“It don’t matter, Raylan, I already know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking I should stand up to my daddy, like you do with yours. I get it, Raylan. You’re already halfway outta Harlan, or you think you are anyway. Course you ain’t gonna take any of Arlo’s bullshit, why should you. We all do what we have to do.”

Most of the time, Boyd didn’t feel much shame at the fact that his daddy still beat the shit out of him, like he was a child. He knew it was what needed doing, and he felt like he wasn’t too affected by it anymore. It was only when he was with Raylan that he started feeling like he was in the wrong, here. That being able to absorb all this pain didn’t mean he was strong, it meant he was a goddamn coward. Raylan was strong, and Boyd sometimes felt small in his presence.

Raylan was quiet for awhile, then he said, “You’re maybe half-right. We do what we think we have to do, that’s for sure. Whether it’s true or not, that’s a different story.”

They drove in silence the rest of the way, and Boyd found a fairly well-covered place to park the truck. Raylan hopped out and went around to the back and climbed up into the bed spreading the blanket out. Boyd came around, and sat on the edge of the lowered hatch.

“Cozy.”

“Take off your shirt, Boyd.”

“Why Raylan, how unromantic. Not even a kiss first?”

“Funny. Take it off, Boyd, and be careful, because I can see at least three places where it’s stuck to your skin.” Raylan made a disgusted noise, and Boyd felt small again. He slowly pulled his flannel shirt off, wincing when it pulled at his wounds.

“Hang on, stop a second,” Raylan said in a softer voice. He reached into the duffel and pulled out a rag and another jar of clear liquid. He soaked the rag in the liquid, which seemed to be just water. He held the wet rag against the outside of Boyd’s shirt where it was glued to his skin with dried blood, and then eased the flannel from Boyd’s body. He did this two more times before Boyd was able to easily remove the shirt.

Boyd sat patiently while Raylan did this for him, feeling like there was no way his humiliation could be any deeper. Somehow, though, he felt safe. He knew Raylan was seeing everything that he hated most about himself, but Raylan already knew all this and was still his friend. Usually, Boyd avoided people he perceived as stronger than himself, or sucked up to them until he found out what he could get from them. Raylan had never felt like a threat, or a mark. Boyd had no idea why he knew he could trust Raylan, but he had done from the very beginning. It hurt, but he would let Raylan see all of this, his deepest shame and pain. He was determined to, in fact.

Raylan had pulled a few more rags, as well as some gauze and tape, from his bag. He took out a pocketknife and started cutting them both into smaller strips. He was very careful as he cleaned the wounds on Boyd’s back with clean rags dipped in moonshine, and Boyd knew he was seeing the healed marks of so many other beatings. Then again, Boyd knew that Raylan also bore some similar scars of his own, and that he understood, at least to a point.

They didn’t speak the whole time Raylan was patching up his back, and when Raylan finally spoke, it was startling even though it was barely louder than a whisper.

“Back’s as good as I can get it. Turn around, lemme see your face.”

Boyd shifted, his back feeling like it was on fire, but better, too. Cleaner. Raylan examined his face closely, with some complicated expression on his own face that Boyd couldn’t read. Raylan did a lot of talking with his eyes, and usually he came across very clearly this way. Boyd could see that Raylan was feeling sad, that much was obvious. There was anger too, and Boyd wasn’t sure where exactly that was directed. Mostly at Bo, probably, but Boyd was sure that some of it was for Boyd himself. There was something else, not familiar on Raylan’s face. On someone else, Boyd might have identified it as desperation, but it seemed impossible on Raylan. A little scary, truth be told.

Raylan dipped a fresh rag into the shine and dabbed at a cut on Boyd’s cheek, and placed a small strip of gauze and some tiny pieces of tape over it. Then he dabbed a bit at Boyd’s split lip, cleaning the blood from around it. It had been many years since someone had touched Boyd in such a gentle way. Not since his momma died had he felt so cared for, and suddenly Boyd had a lump in his throat. He closed his eyes until the feeling had passed, and when he opened them again, Raylan was just sitting there, watching him. He took a deep breath, and Boyd saw his eyes go suddenly clear and determined, which was what Raylan always looked like when he’d decided on a plan. Then he did something that Boyd could not have predicted if he was given a hundred guesses. He leaned forward and kissed Boyd on his damaged lip, just as softly as you please. He sat back after that, now looking just a little bit scared, but calm.

Boyd’s feelings for Raylan were something that he had always kept under close wraps, even from himself. He had long been aware of a great affection for Raylan – something he believed to be returned in kind by his friend - but any time his mind wanted to go somewhere else with it, he pushed it down hard. Raylan was his best friend, his only true friend, and he had never thought that he could feel anything like what Boyd might, possibly, feel for Raylan. Nothing was worth risking that, and even if he knew that Raylan wouldn’t beat him up or tell anyone, losing his friendship would be just as bad as any of that.

“Raylan… what…”

“Shit, I’m sorry Boyd. I thought… I made a mistake. Please, can we just for…” Raylan trailed off as Boyd grabbed his hand and squeezed it in both of his own. Boyd’s eyes were closed, and when he spoke it was in a low, rough voice.  


“Raylan. You didn’t make a mistake. I just… you surprised me. I didn’t know.”

He opened his eyes and saw the look of immense relief on Raylan’s handsome face. Boyd let go of Raylan’s hand and ran both of his up Raylan’s arms to his shoulders. Boyd had kissed a lot of girls, but he didn’t know how to kiss a man. He especially didn’t know how to kiss Raylan, though he suddenly wanted to more than he wanted anything else in this world. Fortunately for him, Raylan didn’t seem to have the same concerns, because he put his hands on Boyd’s waist and leaned in to kiss Boyd on the mouth, more firmly now, but still being very careful of his bottom lip. It went on for awhile, and when they both opened their mouths somewhat tentatively, Boyd thought that if some good old boys came riding up and shot the two of them for being perverts, he’d be more or less ok with that. He was pretty sure that he wasn’t going to get happier in his whole life than he was at this very moment.

Raylan leaned back into the bed of the truck, pulling Boyd with him, and shoving Boyd’s bloody shirt under his head for a pillow. Now Boyd was half on top of Raylan, and he ran his fingers through Raylan’s soft brown hair, and they continued to kiss each other softly, periodically pulling back to look at each other’s face, as if they needed to be reminded that this was really happening. Boyd could feel Raylan’s dick against the leg he had draped over him, and he was glad of it because otherwise he might feel embarrassed about how hard he was against Raylan’s leg. Boyd wanted to touch more of Raylan’s body, but he still wasn’t sure how far Raylan would let him go. When they pulled apart to breathe, Raylan wrapped his arms around Boyd, shifted up and lowered him down onto his back. Looking straight into Boyd’s eyes, he placed a protective hand over the bruise on Boyd’s left temple.

“Raylan, I… “

“I know, Boyd, I know. It’s ok.”

Boyd wasn’t sure what Raylan thought he knew, but he sort of hoped it wasn’t what Boyd was really about to say. He felt grateful to Raylan for stopping him, because there would have been no going back from that.

Raylan reached down and opened the front of Boyd’s jeans, and Boyd lifted his ass and helped Raylan pull them down a bit, along with his shorts. Raylan glanced down quickly, and experimentally ran his thumb along the length of Boyd’s cock. Boyd gasped sharply, and he couldn’t remember ever feeling anything like that, ever. Raylan wrapped his fingers around it and stroked him lightly.

“Raylan, Raylan, I can’t take much of that. Please.”

Raylan leaned down and kissed Boyd again, and then continued to trail kisses across his jaw and down to the side of his neck. He squeezed Boyd’s dick, then let go and raised his hand to his mouth to lick it a few times. Boyd watched him do this, and thought he might come without anyone touching him, just from sheer lust. Raylan reached back down with a saliva-slicked hand, and stroked some more, harder this time. His head was lowered back down into the crook of Boyd’s neck, and he was mumbling some soothing nonsense that Boyd couldn’t really hear, but he could feel the comfort and safety in the low phrases. Boyd figured that’s what both of them were really looking for, at the heart of it.

Boyd was not going to hold it together long, he knew that. He was 19 years old, and this might as well have been his first sexual experience. He’d been with plenty of girls, of course, and had always been proud of his stamina and staying power, which of course made a good deal of sense now he was being a bit more honest with himself. This, with Raylan, it was the most intense thing he had ever felt. Raylan did this unfamiliar thing with the callous on the side of his thumb and the underside of Boyd’s cock, and suddenly Boyd had the thought-picture _This is something he probably does to himself when he’s jerking off_ and then _He thinks of me when he does it_ , and Boyd knew he was about to lose it. He quickly moved his hand down to Raylan’s and stilled it.

“Raylan, hold up a minute. I don’t want to, not yet.”

Raylan was breathing hard, had been rubbing himself against Boyd’s leg the whole time and might have been fairly close himself, but he halted his movements along with his hand. He took the opportunity to resume the soft kisses he’d been placing on Boyd’s bruised face, and whispering amazing things into his ear.

“Boyd… wanted you for so long, you have no idea. Been wanting to touch you like this for months. Thought about it all the time. Dreamed about it, even.”

It was surprising to Boyd, who had been so repressive of his own thoughts, that Raylan had been so honest with himself. It was Raylan, though, so maybe it wasn’t so strange. This was just another way in which Raylan proved himself to be the stronger man, the better man. He resolved to be a bit stronger now, and not to hesitate so much where Raylan was concerned. If Raylan could be as brave as he was, then Boyd could try to meet him somewhere in the middle. He reached up under Raylan’s shirt and felt his ribs under goose bumped flesh. He ran his hand down Raylan’s smooth stomach until he got to his jeans, then unbuttoned and unzipped him. Boyd’s hand was shaking a little, but Raylan didn’t help him. He just kept on kissing Boyd intently, as if the world hadn’t just turned upside down on both of them. Boyd finally managed to get the zipper down and work his hand inside. The heat of Raylan’s cock was astonishing to Boyd as he pulled it free and ran his hand up and down a few times, then lowered it to his balls. Raylan’s eyes rolled up and drifted shut at this, and he pulled Boyd’s hand away, trapping both of their lengths between them and grinding his body into Boyd. Boyd pushed back up at Raylan, and they rocked together for a while.

Every few seconds, Boyd felt a little jolt to his stomach, as if he were receiving tiny, periodic electric shocks to his lower body. Then Raylan buried his face in Boyd’s neck and started jerking his hips harder, less rhythmically and more desperately. Boyd matched him, and then they were coming, sliding together and shuddering. Raylan made a sound that was a little bit like a sob into Boyd’s neck, and Boyd buried his face in Raylan’s hair, inhaling the familiar smell that Boyd always associated with warmth, and easiness, and relief. Raylan’s hair smelled like home should smell, and for Boyd, Raylan was as much home as anything else in his life. More than, truly.

Boyd reached out and grabbed two of the less-used rags, handed one to Raylan and used the other to clean himself up. After they’d gotten themselves sorted out, Raylan pulled the edge of the blanket over both of them, and Boyd settled in with his head resting on the crook of Raylan’s arm. Raylan had his long, strong arm around Boyd and was holding him as tightly as he could while still being careful of Boyd’s injuries. Boyd again felt small, but he found that he didn’t mind it so much right now.

“Raylan, when you first kissed me… why did you do that? How did you know?”

“I didn’t know. Why do you think I was so fucking scared? I thought, maybe, but I wasn’t at all sure.”

“How did you do it, then? You’re either braver than I can imagine, or you wanted me so bad you were ready to die for it. Not that I could fault you for that, of course.”

Raylan smiled at that, and said, “Well, I did want you that bad, but never thought I’d have to die for it. I knew you wouldn’t hurt me. I was pretty sure you’d give me space to laugh it off and we could maybe just go on as if it hadn’t happened, if need be. I trust you, Boyd. I feel bad that you didn’t trust me that much, but I guess I understand. If you hadn’t come to my house all beat to shit tonight, I’m not sure how long I would have waited.”

Boyd felt that lump come back up in his throat, and this time he let a few of the tears that wanted to follow leak out of his eyes and onto Raylan’s chest, because Raylan wasn’t brave tonight just because that’s how he is. He was brave because he trusted Boyd. Raylan stroked his fingers through Boyd’s hair and pressed a kiss to the top of his head.

“You gonna stay here with me tonight, Raylan?”

“I ain’t going anywhere, Boyd.”

They didn’t do anymore talking after that, and eventually they both drifted off to sleep.


	2. I Wonder If Anyone Here Besides Me's Got Any Decent Secrets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The morning after. Mostly sex.

Raylan woke up with his arm completely numb and dead under Boyd’s weight. The sky was just starting to lighten to a deep blue, and he could see the faintest orange light on the other side of the lake. He eased his arm out from under his friend, and Boyd turned onto his side, away from Raylan. Raylan snuggled back down into the covers and laid his arm around Boyd’s waist. He didn’t know what to expect from Boyd this morning, whether he would be regretful or upset about what had happened. Boyd had let his guard down with Raylan in a way that he didn’t usually do, even before anything sexual had happened between them. Raylan didn’t want to give Boyd the chance to backpedal, wanted to cement whatever shaky bond they had created last night before it was too late. He ran his hand slowly up Boyd’s stomach to his chest, brushing lightly against both nipples before heading back down. Boyd’s eyes were still closed and his breathing hadn’t changed, but Raylan had the sense that he wasn’t completely asleep anymore. He moved his hand down further to the front of Boyd’s boxers and found that at least one part of Boyd was wide awake. Raylan pressed his erection into Boyd’s backside and reached in to take hold of Boyd’s cock. Now Boyd’s breathing did change, though his eyes remained closed.

Raylan continued to squeeze and stroke Boyd’s very hard erection, and then Boyd murmured something that made him pause and let go.

“Becky, you do that so nice. C’mon baby, put your mouth on it for me. Give it a little kiss, huh?”

Raylan was about to say something, and then he noticed the slight smirk on Boyd’s face, like he was trying not to laugh. Raylan chuckled and said, “You first, Boyd.”

Boyd turned himself around in Raylan’s arms and kissed his mouth. In the morning light, Raylan could see that Boyd’s face was in even worse shape than he’d realized the night before.

“On second thought, maybe we can wait until that mouth is a little bit better. I guess I could go first. If you want.”

“Uh uh, Raylan. Me first, like you said. I can do that for you.”

“I don’t want you to hurt yourself for my sake, Boyd. C’mon, it’s ok. We have plenty of time.”

Boyd looked at Raylan for a moment, then gave him a half-smile and shook his head slowly. Then he slid down Raylan’s body and took his dick in hand. He licked the length of Raylan’s hard cock, opened his sore mouth as wide as it would go and took about half of him in. Raylan groaned and his hips strained upward.

“Sorry. Couldn’t help it. Oh my god, Boyd. That’s…”

Boyd started bobbing up and down, getting it a little further in each time. Raylan was panting and making little sounds in his throat, and he didn’t want this to be over already. He needed more of Boyd first.

“Boyd, stop!”

Boyd pulled off and looked up at Raylan with unfocused, almost delirious eyes.

“Come up here, please. I just want to kiss you some more. I think I like that better than anything.”

Boyd moved up next to Raylan and looked at him with wide eyes. He brought his hand up to cup Raylan’s cheek, and leaned in for more kissing. Raylan felt some kind of big emotion welling up inside of him at that touch. It seemed more intimate even than the clumsy yet thrilling blowjob Boyd had been giving him a moment ago. He kissed Boyd harder, and then pulled away to take his turn at learning a new skill. Raylan spread Boyd’s legs apart and braced himself on his knees in between them. He opened his mouth and sucked a little on the head of Boyd’s cock. Boyd moaned and put his hand lightly on the top of Raylan’s head. He let it slide in a bit further, though Raylan could see just by looking that he wasn’t getting all of it into his mouth. He felt it hit the back of his throat and gagged a little before pulling back slightly. He moved his tongue around experimentally, and Boyd jerked and grabbed his hair. Raylan started rubbing Boyd’s thigh with his left hand, while the other hand moved up to Boyd’s chest and explored. This went on awhile, with Raylan working on getting comfortable and trying to find a rhythm. He could feel how worked up Boyd was getting, and Raylan wasn’t sure if he could handle Boyd coming in his mouth. He pulled off to take a deep breath and thought about the Golden Rule, then he dove back onto Boyd’s cock and started sucking in earnest. That was it for Boyd, and he started bucking up into Raylan’s mouth. Raylan slid his hands under Boyd’s ass and squeezed as Boyd started pulsing into his mouth. Boyd was shouting some nonsense that Raylan mostly couldn’t decipher, although he could have sworn he heard the word “love” at least one time. Raylan was a gentleman though, and wouldn’t dream of using that against him. Raylan crawled back up to where Boyd was lying and put his hand on Boyd’s face.

“Touch me now, ok? I can’t wait anymore.”

Boyd reached for Raylan, and no sooner did he have his hand wrapped around him than Raylan started jerking up into Boyd’s fist and coming almost immediately. He didn’t shout like Boyd had, but wrapped his arms around Boyd’s shoulders and hugged him as tightly as he could, and pressed his teeth against Boyd’s jaw. They stayed like that until their breathing had settled, and Boyd grabbed another rag, which he used to clean up his hand and Raylan’s crotch. After that, Raylan settled down against Boyd in basically the same way that Boyd had slept on Raylan, and their bodies cooled in the morning air.

“This is what it is, ok Boyd? There’s no telling ourselves it didn’t happen or that it didn’t mean nothing.”

Boyd sighed a little shakily, and said, “Yeah, that’s how it is. But Raylan… that’s what we know for our own selves. No one else is going to be able to know. How the hell do we do that?”

“I don’t know, Boyd. We’ll figure something out, I guess. You know, there are places where this isn’t considered a killing offense. We could maybe… go somewhere else, eventually. If we still… you know.”

“Raylan…”

“We can talk about it later, Boyd. Or not at all. I just want to know that you’re ok with this. You’re not going to freak out on me.”

“I ain’t going to freak out, but I can’t say I won’t be a little bit scared, Raylan. I’m not, not with you here. But I might be later on.”

“I might be too, Boyd.”

“OK, then. Let’s go get some breakfast.”

Boyd grinned at Raylan, and Raylan suddenly felt a little bit light-headed. In the last 8 hours, his whole life had changed, and yet on the surface it was exactly the same. Everyone would see the same man, his terrible job would be the same, he’d still have the same abusive loser for a father and a mother who was getting sicker, and he still had no future that he could see. But Raylan felt happy for once, and he figured he might as well let that ride for awhile. He grinned back at Boyd, and stuffed everything back into the duffel (making a mental note to wash those rags when no one was home) before hopping off the side of the truck bed and climbing into the cab. Boyd rolled up the blanket and shoved it behind the drivers seat, and they headed into town.


	3. Won't You Lay Here For Awhile, Please Do Not Let Me Go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things are going well for Raylan and Boyd, until Arlo finds out. Then Raylan's mama dies and things happen.

Boyd and Raylan worked the same shift, so most afternoons they’d leave work and head right away out to the lake for a swim to wash the coal dirt from their bodies. Since starting at the coalmine, Raylan had been feeling much older than his years, and Boyd, who had been expected to raise himself since his mama died, had been feeling that way for much longer. These days, though, no matter how they felt during the rest of their lives, the two of them felt very young when they were together. Sometimes they felt 19, as they were, but other times even younger. They stripped down and swam and horsed around, dunking each other under the water and yelling at the top of their lungs. It came more naturally to Boyd, whereas Raylan sometimes needed to be convinced to let go, which Boyd was more than happy to oblige him with. Boyd felt so full of joy on these afternoons, even while feeling the precarious balance of the thing. He knew that Raylan returned his feelings completely – he had no doubts at all about that. He could see it in Raylan’s face, and feel it in his embraces after the playing stopped and they began the more serious business of… well, Boyd called it love, in his own head anyway. He would not say it out loud, not like that first night. Boyd wasn’t afraid that Raylan didn’t feel the same way, but he wasn’t sure that he would put it quite like that, would be comfortable with such a term. Boyd wasn't either, that's how he knew, but he had finished with lying to his own self anyway. They would come together in the water and explore each other until neither one could stand it anymore, and then they’d get out and jump into the bed of Boyd’s truck, or they’d find a spot in the woods to lay a blanket down. The fear of discovery was always with him, and probably with Raylan too, but neither was willing to give up the kind of joy these afternoons brought them.

They had about a month of this idyllic existence before Raylan said that his mama was getting too sick for him to be spending so much time out of the house. He needed to be around to fix dinner for her, and do what needed to be done, because Arlo surely wasn’t going to. Boyd would sometimes come by to help, or just to eat what Raylan had cooked, as long as Arlo wasn’t around. And Arlo, quite frequently, was not around. He was down at the VFW getting shit-faced drunk and often didn’t come home until around the early hours. Frances would be in bed by 8 or so, and Raylan and Boyd would sit out in the back of the house, sometimes fooling around but often just sitting around on some old lawn chairs, talking and drinking a bit.

"Raylan, that chicken dinner was about the best one I ever tasted. You would make a fine wife for some lucky man."

"Hmm, I wonder where I could find one of those in Harlan. Not sure I've ever met a lucky man around these parts."

"Oh, I don't know. I been havin' a pretty good run of it just lately. Fact, some days I simply cannot believe my luck."

Raylan looked over at Boyd and with a slow smile. Boyd could see that Raylan’s eyes were full of things he was trying to say, and Boyd smiled back at him because he had always been pretty good at hearing him.

“Want to come over here and show me how lucky you feel, Boyd?”

Boyd didn't have to be asked twice, so he stood up and walked over to Raylan's chair, offering a hand to pull him up. They wrapped their arms around each other and kissed deeply, both of them hard already and eager to get as close as they could.

It was well into September now, and starting to get a little bit chilly at night, but the neither felt it a bit as they walked a ways into the stand of trees behind the house. They were holding hands, and Boyd found himself thinking about how he might have reacted to seeing two men do such a thing, just a short time ago. Might even react that way now, if he witnessed someone else doing it. He knew it probably looked ridiculous, and thought maybe it should make him feel ridiculous, or like a girl. The reality of the thing, though, that was something else. Raylan’s hand was warm, dry and calloused, but most of all it was strong. He thought about Raylan’s hands doing all the other things Boyd had seen them doing – mining coal, playing baseball, resting lightly on the lower back of Raylan’s junior year girlfriend, Tess. Then, placing a strip of gauze and some slivers of tape over a cut on Boyd’s cheekbone, gripping Boyd’s shoulders as they kissed against the house, confidently opening Boyd’s jeans and reaching in to take hold of him. Boyd squeezed Raylan’s hand then, and he found that he didn’t particularly care about what was ridiculous. Boyd had been feeling himself changing somehow, during the time he’d been with Raylan. Things he had once thought laughable were starting to seem almost possible, almost within reach. He was almost ready to talk to Raylan about this, to tell him that maybe he was right. Maybe they could find someplace they could be who they were together without getting beat to death, but where they could still be who they had always been. That was the main obstacle; it was the thing Boyd feared most. If they moved somewhere that didn’t understand boys like them – Kentucky boys, that is, sons of the hills – would they have to change? And if they changed, would they still make sense together? Boyd didn’t think he could change, not really, but he thought maybe Raylan could. That maybe Raylan wanted to, even.

They found a spot that seemed more or less private, and Boyd pulled Raylan down to the ground and rolled on top of him. He was mostly happy to let his friend take the lead in these matters, but tonight Boyd felt powerful. He wanted to take charge, to show Raylan (and himself) that he could. He grasped Raylan’s hands and pushed them back into the ground, then fell to kissing and licking Raylan on the neck while grinding their lower bodies together. Then he pulled back to look at Raylan, who had a slightly puzzled but pleased expression on his face.

“You’re in rare form tonight, Boyd. What’s got into you?”

“Just you, Raylan. You’ve got into me.”

“Well, not yet I haven’t,” Raylan said in a low, amused voice.

Boyd’s eyes widened a bit as he thought about what Raylan was saying.

“Is that something you want to do?”

“I don’t know. I don’t really know how. Ain’t a lot of girls around here willing to give that a try.”

“You can have me, Raylan. If you want me, you can. ”

Raylan reached up and pulled Boyd down for a hard kiss, and they did all the things they usually did together. By the end, they were both a shaking, sweating mess, and they lay still together for a long time before they got up.

“I guess I should get on home. I got no idea what time it is, but it has to be getting pretty late.”

“I guess. Hey, Boyd?”

“Hmm?”

“What you said before? About… you know…”

“Yeah. I know.”

“I do want to, ok? Sometime.”

Boyd grinned. He felt like the brave one, for once, and he thought maybe, if they did that, it would be a good time to talk to Raylan about all the things he’d been thinking of. If he could be brave enough to do that one thing, then maybe he could be brave enough to go further, even to leave here. He suddenly felt like running, and he clapped Raylan on the back and said, “You’ll have to catch me first,” and took off through the trees. Raylan was quick to give chase, and they ended up at the edge of the woods, laughing and panting. Raylan reached over and pulled Boyd in by the shoulder. He gave Boyd a friendly sort of kiss on the mouth, and Boyd pulled Raylan even closer with an arm around his waist. He started to lean in for a far less casual kiss, when he heard a shotgun being cocked. Both men pushed away from each other immediately.

“What the fuck is this?” Arlo was speaking in a low growl and walking toward them. Raylan was staring at Arlo, and Boyd was looking straight at the ground. Both of their faces were burning bright red, and Boyd’s heart felt like it was going to pound its way out of his chest. “I always knew you were a loser, Raylan, always knew you were no damn good, but I never thought you’d turn out to be a goddamn freak. I never thought you’d show such little respect to your mama, to be out here doing something like this while she’s in there dying.”

Raylan had been frozen while Arlo spoke, but when the last sentence came out of Arlo’s mouth, Raylan’s mouth dropped open.

“How dare you say anything about me, you pathetic old man? I don’t give a shit what you think of me, haven’t for a long time, but you have no right to use my mama against me. Where the hell have you been? Who do you think cooks dinner for her, helps her get ready for bed, makes sure she gets her medicine?”

“You are a pervert, a freak of nature. You think you can bring this disgusting behavior around my house, and expect me to look the other way? Boyd Crowder, you need to get the hell out of here right now and don’t ever let me see you around here again. I will shoot you on sight. Stay away from me, stay away from Raylan.”

Boyd nodded, still looking at the ground, and walked quickly down the drive. He was still able to hear a bit of what Raylan said next, and it made him feel ashamed of himself for leaving. He knew he should stay and stand by Raylan, but this incident had shown him quite clearly just how precarious this whole thing was. He could see now how foolish he’d been earlier that night, thinking that this could ever be something good for them. It felt good, he couldn’t deny that, but in the end it would only bring more suffering on both of them.

“Arlo, you listen to me. You breathe one word of this to anyone else, and you will die. Do you understand me? And if you do anything to Boyd, if you hurt him in any way, you will die. I will take you out to this yard and put you down like a dog. This is not an empty threat, Arlo, I will kill you without hesitation.”

Arlo narrowed his eyes at Raylan, but eventually nodded. Boyd got in his truck and drove back to his daddy’s house, and tried to remember his life as it was before Raylan. It was a fairly terrible thing to think of, but he knew he had to face it. He also knew that Raylan wouldn’t stay much longer in Harlan without Boyd to hold him here, and maybe that was for the best.

**************************************************************

Raylan called out sick the next morning, so Boyd spent that day in the mine getting used to the way it felt being down there by himself. In a way, it was better down there in the dark than on the surface. He could think about whatever he liked, and if it showed on his face he didn’t have to explain it to anyone.

The next day was Saturday, and Bo had some work for Boyd, so he stayed pretty busy. When the afternoon turned golden, of course it made him think of Raylan, and the lake, and the temptation to go and seek him out was almost paralyzing. He wanted to feel the way he’d felt yesterday, when he was as brave as he’d ever been and ready to do anything. He drove into town and stopped at the market to pick up the smokes Bo had told him to get, and almost walked straight into Raylan’s aunt Helen.

“Excuse me Miss Helen, I was not paying a bit of attention to where I was walking.” He looked at Helen’s face and saw that she had been crying. “Is there something I can help you with, ma’am? Are you ok?”

“There’s nothing you can do Boyd, but you should know what’s going on. My sister Frances… Raylan’s mama… she passed yesterday afternoon. I know you and Raylan have been good friends lately, and I think he might welcome a visit later on.”

“Well, Miss Helen, I am surely sorry to hear that. Please tell Raylan that I will try to come by this evening when I can get away.”

Boyd had no intention of going near the Givens home, of course, but he did want to see Raylan. He’d be hurting pretty bad. Boyd dropped the cigarettes off with Bo, packed a bag and headed out to the lake, hoping that Raylan would get the message and understand.

Boyd had been sitting there for an hour or so when he heard someone walking through the trees to the clearing. It was getting dark and the stars were coming out, and Raylan’s face was lit up by the moon. Boyd thought he looked perfect like this, perfectly at home and beautiful.

Boyd stood up and faced him. Raylan approached and laid his head on Boyd’s shoulder, and Boyd held him tightly while he cried. Boyd felt like he had been given another chance, like he could maybe still do something to save what they had, but he still didn’t know that he should try.

“Raylan. I’m so sorry about your mama. She was a good woman, and I know she did her best for you.”

“It should have been him, Boyd. Why couldn't he be the one to get eaten up with cancer and die? He’s the one who deserves to die.”

“No, she’s at peace now. Death ain’t always the worst thing in the world, Raylan. I know you miss her though. I’m so sorry, I truly am.”

“This feels terrible. Make me feel better, Boyd.”

Boyd tangled his fingers in the hair on the back of Raylan’s head and pulled gently until they were looking into each other’s eyes. Boyd couldn’t decipher everything that was going on in Raylan’s expressive face, but he could see enough. Boyd kissed him then, trying his best to pour everything he felt into it. He needed Raylan to understand, needed him to know that Boyd really did want him, wanted everything he had to offer, if he were only brave enough to take it. He knew that would be cold comfort when Raylan was off in the world alone, but at least it would be something.

Boyd opened Raylan’s pants and pulled them down as he knelt in front of him. He took Raylan into his mouth, so much more smoothly than the first time they’d done this. He’d learned what Raylan liked best, and in no time Boyd had him moaning and grasping at his hair. Boyd pulled off then and took Raylan by the hand back to where he’d parked the truck. Raylan stumbled along, holding up his pants, and fell into the truckbed where Boyd had spread out a blanket – the same blanket Raylan had taken from his own bed that first night. Boyd removed his own jeans, and helped Raylan out of his. Then he reached into a bag that he’d brought and pulled out a jar of Vaseline. Raylan’s swallowed, but looked steadily at Boyd and nodded.

“Are you sure you want to do this?”

“I’m sure I want you, Raylan.”

“Do you know what to do?”

“I have a theoretical understanding of the process, yes.”

Raylan laughed at that, somewhat nervously. They both laughed a little as they started, because neither of them had ever seen themselves doing any such thing. It was far beyond what either of them might have imagined before they were together. Before long, though, it didn’t seem so strange or frightening. Boyd could never have imagined the intense pleasure of being in Raylan’s mouth while Raylan’s fingers worked into him from behind. He kept thinking, _Raylan’s beautiful fingers, his beautiful hands, inside me, on me…_ Then Raylan touched a place inside of him that he had no idea existed, and he froze.

“Oh Raylan… now... I want you Raylan… do it now.”

Boyd knew Raylan loved to hear the sound of his own name in Boyd’s voice, and Boyd loved saying it just as much. Raylan groaned loudly and pulled his fingers out. He coated his dick with more Vaseline and lay back on the blanket.

“You do it, Boyd. You put it in, OK?”

Boyd straddled Raylan’s waist and reached down to grasp his dick. He lowered himself down onto it and started to push very slowly. It hurt, more than the fingers had, more than he had expected. He took a deep breath and kept his eyes fixed on Raylan’s, which were very clear and very determined. He knew what that meant – Raylan had a plan and meant to follow through. Boyd pushed further down, then more, and finally he had all of Raylan inside of him. He moved up and down a little bit, hesitantly at first, and then more boldly as he got used to it. Raylan was breathing pretty heavily and looked like he was concentrating very hard. Boyd changed angles slightly, and then there it was again, that feeling. That place inside of him that when touched, seemed to scratch every itch he’d ever had all at once. He moved faster up and down, coming down harder each time. Raylan reached up to wrap his hand around Boyd’s cock, and then Boyd was pulling up and slamming back down, shouting _Oh my god, oh Raylan, oh my god_ over and over. Raylan was coming hard, thrusting his hips up to meet Boyd’s pushes, and then Boyd was coming too, striping up Raylan’s chest.

Boyd pulled off of Raylan and used a towel he had packed with the Vaseline to clean Raylan and himself up as best he could. When he lay back down, Raylan gathered him up in his arms and murmured, “Thank you. You did make it better.”

Boyd held on to Raylan for a long time after that, and they fell asleep together after awhile. He thought about all the things he’d once planned to talk to Raylan about, but none of that seemed real anymore. When they parted a few hours later, Boyd wasn’t sure if he’d see Raylan again. He thought maybe Raylan’d just pack up and leave in the night. And Boyd thought, maybe that was for the best.

Boyd would play back those first beautiful afternoons in his mind many times in the years to come, and they were often the only things keeping Boyd from going off the deep end. They were like little pieces of gold that he could take out when he needed them, and rather than fade they seemed to get shinier with time. They always made him feel like crying, but he almost never did. These memories couldn't offer him any hope, but they did serve as a reminder that he must have had some worth once, because someone like Raylan Givens had been willing to give himself to Boyd. Sometimes that was just enough to get him through.


	4. For All the Hours Here that Move Too Slow, There's All this Letting Go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Boyd is letting Raylan go. Raylan wants to keep Boyd with him. The mine collapses, and everything changes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not completely satisfied with this chapter. I've certainly never been in a coal mine, and have no idea what a cave-in would be like to experience. I apologize for anything I've gotten wrong, and I tried to focus more on what was going on in the relationship instead. Feedback is welcome.

Raylan showed up for his shift on Monday morning, same as any other. He knew things would be changing – needed to change – but he didn’t know how to make that happen. Too many things were in play right now, and he thought if maybe he could just nail down one of them, he’d be able to figure everything out. He needed to talk to Boyd; really, that was the only thing that was truly nagging at him. Raylan felt uneasy about the way they’d left things, in the early hours of Sunday morning. The whole thing was so intense, and even though it should have seemed like a step forward, it somehow felt more like a goodbye.

Boyd’s truck was already in the lot when Raylan pulled in, and as he was walking in, Boyd was walking out. He lifted a hand and said casually “Hey, Raylan. I took an early shift from Mullen today. Bo needs me to do some runs for him today. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Uh… ok Boyd. Meet me later on? I got nowhere to be after work now.”

“I don’t think I can, Raylan. I’m going to get some sleep now, and I’ll be busy with those runs the rest of the day. Some other time, maybe.”

Raylan stared at him, trying to understand what Boyd was telling him. He couldn’t really interpret it as anything but rejection. He nodded and said, “Alright, then. See you tomorrow.”

Boyd was on the same shift again the next day, but he was clearly avoiding Raylan. When he spoke, he was friendly. There was no hostility, but neither was there any evidence of the friendship they were accustomed to showing the world when they were together in public. They were friends, after all, regardless of anything else they might be. At lunch, Boyd would read a book that he’d brought with him, and Raylan sat with a few of the other miners. One of them jokingly asked if the two of them were having marital difficulties, and Raylan had a moment of pure panic before realizing that he wouldn’t have said something like that in such a light-hearted manner if he’d had any inkling of how close he’d come to the mark. Raylan managed a convincing enough laugh and said he thought maybe Boyd was just on his period. He glanced over at Boyd who gave him a wry look and a hat-tipping gesture.

Raylan went out to the lake after work anyway, because he had been telling the truth – he had nowhere else to be. The last place he wanted to be was Arlo’s house, and the lake seemed like as good a place as any. And of course, there was always the chance that Boyd would decide to show up- but he never did.

This went on for the next several days, and Raylan felt a little bit like he was losing his mind. The thought that everything between him and Boyd had been completely in his imagination actually crossed his mind once or twice, like those crazy celebrity stalkers who imagined entire relationships with people they had never met.

On Thursday morning, Raylan got to work very early, and Boyd’s truck was nowhere to be seen. He waited in his car until he saw the old pickup pull into the lot, then got out and walked quickly over to it. He went up to the window and said in a low, serious voice “We need to talk.”

“Raylan, I don’t think this is the best time-“

“Boyd, this is the only time. You have to talk to me, I’m going out of my goddamn mind.”

Boyd sighed and said resignedly, “Alright Raylan, get in. Let’s talk.”

Raylan walked around and climbed into the passenger seat. Boyd stared straight ahead with a stony expression on his face.

“What are you doing, Boyd? Is this about Saturday night? I never would have asked you to-“

“God, Raylan, no. It ain’t about that. It’s just that… well, I kind of thought you’d be heading out. Your mama’s gone, so there’s nothing to hold you here. You’ve only been talking about leaving since I first knew you, Raylan, I thought you’d jump at the chance. I thought we were saying goodbye out there at the lake.”

“Well, maybe you were, Boyd. I wasn’t. You think I’d just leave you here, with Bo and Bowman and fucking Arlo holding a big goddamn shoe he could drop the minute I was out of the picture? Shit, Boyd, is that really what you think of me?”

Boyd looked a bit ashamed at that, and Raylan knew that he was being somewhat unfair. He was starting to let himself feel a bit angry, though, and all of the stress and confusion of the past several days was coming to the surface.

“Oh, of course. How could I be so dumb? That’s not what you think of me, that’s just what you know about yourself. You put yourself in my shoes, and that’s what you saw yourself doing.”

“Fuck you, Raylan. You think you’re some big hero in this story? You think you can protect me from my big, bad daddy and the rest of these hillbillies who would kill us – no questions asked – if they knew what we’d been up to? Well, you can’t. You want to protect me, the best thing you can do is to get the hell out of Harlan.”

“That’s it, then? That’s what you want, you want me away from you? Fine. Helen offered me money, you know. I was going to ask you to come with me – I would still ask you, matter of fact – but I know there’s no point. You won’t leave here. You’ll never leave here. I’m done wasting energy on this.”

Raylan stalked away and went to punch in. Boyd followed a few moments later, and they worked side by side the whole morning in almost total silence. Suddenly, the silence ended, and all around them there was deafening noise, and blinding dust. People were yelling, and Raylan couldn’t understand any of it. The world was falling in around them – their world, down here in the dark, was about to make them a part of the mountain, just as it had done to so many other men for generations past.

In the dark, in the chaos and terror, Raylan felt someone's hand searching for his. He grabbed it and held on like it could save him, as if it didn't belong to someone else who would be dying here next to him any minute. It could have been any of them, he supposed. Men don't necessarily cling to the conventions of polite society when a mountain is caving in on them. He knew it wasn't, though. He knew it was Boyd, because he had felt that hand in his so many times. The long, slender fingers wrapped themselves around his, and the two of them ran as fast as they could away from the cave-in, feeling rock raining down on them the whole way and hearing the shouts of their fellow miners all around them. Raylan knew he would have still been paralyzed, rooted to the spot, if Boyd hadn't pulled him forward.

They escaped the crush of rock, barely, but the exit was blocked. All the men on the shift stood around and looked at each other. Boyd and Raylan were still holding hands, but no one seemed to notice. Things like that didn't matter down here, not now when they all knew they might not make it out of here. They were the youngest men down here - everyone else was in their 20s or 30s, with wives and kids waiting for them. Raylan knew it was worse for them, he couldn't deny it, but he also couldn't help feeling sorry for himself. He'd known this was going to happen, he'd felt it the day he signed on at this mine. Dying in a coal mine. This was the end he had always feared for himself, and now that it was happening, he felt stupid. Why had he ever come down here?

Everyone sat down, still trying to catch their breath amidst the sea of dust. Boyd spoke quietly, almost into Raylan's ear.   
"We're not going to die down here, Raylan. They'll get us out."

"You can't know that."

"Listen. You're right, I don't. But what's the point in assuming they won't? Then you're just waiting to die."

"Isn't that what you've been doing pretty much your whole life anyway, Boyd? Maybe that's why you can be so goddamn calm."

Boyd didn't answer, but he squeezed Raylan's hand a bit harder. They sat silently for awhile, and they could hear the soft conversations of the other miners. After a long while, Raylan spoke again.

"I was wrong about what I said earlier. I know that now, and I'm sorry I said it. I think... maybe you were right about me, too. I've been trying to figure out how to go, how to get out from under all the shit in my life."

"Shit like me, huh."

"Boyd-"

"It's fine Raylan, I get it, truly. I can't even be angry, because you're right. You should get out of here, and away from me. This place is not for you."

"Boyd, shut the hell up a minute. We are trapped under a goddamn mountain. We are probably going to die, so just stop." Raylan lowered his voice enough that he was reasonably sure no one else could hear, and said, "Come with me. Please, please come with me. I... need you. You're the only friend I have in this world, Boyd, and that is a fact."

Boyd was stroking the top of Raylan's hand with his thumb now, and he said, "OK. I'll come with you, Raylan. We'll go... somewhere better. We can do whatever we want."

Raylan closed his eyes and felt Boyd's thumb, moving back and forth on his hand. He wanted to kiss Boyd, wanted to touch all of him now. If they were going to die, he wanted to feel that good one more time. Of course he couldn't, of course he didn't, because he knew they might get out of this alive. So he focused on where their hands met, and tried to communicate his feelings through this touch. He pushed his fingers up into Boyd's cuff and and rubbed the underside of his wrist, and he thought he heard Boyd let out a soft sigh. It was enough for now, and they sat like that for a very long time. They talked a little bit, mostly about nothing, but sometimes they talked about things that were very important in ways that no one could have understood.

When they were finally rescued, the two of them walked out behind the rest of the miners, holding on to each other until the very last possible moment. They let go just as they exited into the evening air. Boyd's brother and his daddy were there to meet him, and Helen was there for Raylan. Not Arlo, no, of course not. Just as well, though Raylan couldn't quite escape the bitterness of that final rejection. Boyd looked back for a final wave as he walked toward his truck, and Raylan lifted his hand back. On the way home, Helen gave him the stack of cash that she had offered him days before.

"You need to take this now, Raylan. This is it, you will not spend another day in that mine, or in your father's house. You will get the hell out of this town and not look back, do you understand me?"

Raylan nodded and took the money from Helen. After a few minutes, she spoke again, this time hesitantly.

"Is Boyd coming with you?"

"Boyd? Why would he?" Raylan felt distinctly uneasy at the direction this conversation seemed to be headed.

"Raylan... Boyd Crowder is someone who probably could have been a good man, if he'd had a different daddy. I believe he may still have that in him, but I don't think he has too many more chances in him. If you take him with you, you might save him. Or he might bring you down with him, you need to be prepared for that. I don't want to embarrass you, but I ain't blind either. That boy loves you, you know that, right?"

"Helen... did Arlo say something to you?"

She looked at Raylan sharply then, with fear in her eyes.

"Arlo knows something? Raylan, what are you still doing in town, then?

"If I leave, Boyd is exposed. He knows I'd kill him if he did anything, but if I leave..."

"So you're leaving him here, then? That don't sound like you."

"It's not. It's him. He can't see himself out of Harlan. He won't go." As Raylan was saying this, he could feel the truth of it. He knew that Boyd's words down in the mine were only for Raylan's sake. Or, well, maybe for Boyd's own sake too. Maybe he'd been able to let himself believe it too, for as long as they were down there. Now that they were back in the surface world, however, Raylan knew it was a lie.

"You let me worry about Arlo, Raylan. You just get on out of here. You can stay with me tonight, and leave tomorrow morning."

"Thank you, Helen. I don't know what to..."

"Thank me by doing something with your life."

The next morning, Raylan woke up and threw his bag into his car. Helen had packed for him while he'd been down in the mine, and Raylan could see a picture of what that must have looked like in his mind. She had packed his things, not knowing if he'd ever get out. He wondered if she'd been crying, but decided that she probably wasn't. Not that she didn't love him, but she was a Harlan woman. They grew up prepared for just that very thing. Helen made him some eggs and bacon, hugged him hard, and by the time he was ready to leave it was around 10am.

He drove out to the lake, not because he thought Boyd would be there, but because he wanted to see it one more time. He figured that if Boyd was really coming with him, he'd be there already, and of course he wasn't. Raylan stuck around for an hour or so, though, sitting by the water and thinking about everything. It had really been a hell of a week. Then he got up, slid into his old car, and Raylan Givens rode out of Harlan without looking back.


	5. I Was Lost, I Was Lost, Tried to Find the Balance, Got Caught Up in the Cost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Boyd and Raylan's reunion, through to the end of Bulletville. I used some of the actual scenes, but messed around with them a bit, of course.

Twenty years had passed since the last time Boyd Crowder had seen Raylan Givens in the flesh. In his mind, Raylan was still 19, so when he stepped out of his unremarkable car and into Boyd's yard, it took a moment for Boyd to process the changes the years had brought. Boyd walked out of the front of the church with welcoming arms, determined to play this as brazenly as he possibly could. He knew nothing else would get him through this reunion in one piece - he could not let Raylan in, even a little bit. He wasn't sure what he'd expected - maybe that Raylan had let himself go a little soft, or that his hair would be thinning a bit on top like Boyd's own hair was. Whatever it was that Boyd had been hoping for, and perhaps dreading a bit at the same time, it hadn't happened. Raylan walked up to meet Boyd with a smirk and a big, ridiculous hat that suited him perfectly nevertheless. He was still hard and lean, with the same long, skinny legs he'd had back when he'd played baseball in high school. This was obviously going to be harder than Boyd had originally thought. Well, nothing to do but address it head on, Boyd figured. Let Raylan think it didn't affect him.

"Suit, tie... lookin' good! Lookin' like a lawman."

They hugged, and Boyd thought he could see the same assessing look on his face that had probably been on Boyd's as well. He knew he looked pretty good still, even with the loss of a little bit of hair. He gave Raylan a big grin, which Raylan started to return before his eyes flicked to Boyd's left bicep. His lip curled in disgust, and Boyd was pretty sure he saw something like despair in his eyes before he reigned it in. Boyd was glad he'd seen, had purposely worn something that would let it be seen. It would keep him away, and keep Boyd from allowing himself to imagine that there could be anything between Raylan and himself anymore. All that was gone, dead twenty years ago.

They spent the rest of the visit talking about the church bombing, which Boyd knew that Raylan had no doubts about. It seemed like Raylan was trying to reassure himself of something about Boyd, though what the point was, Boyd couldn't imagine. As if Raylan thought that Boyd blowing up a church was more acceptable if it was just about drugs and money, and not the race war. Maybe it was, Boyd didn't know. He was an opportunist, and he really didn't care one way or the other about blacks or Jews or any of that horse shit. He talked the talk to Raylan, though, but he used a voice that he hoped Raylan would remember for what it was. He hadn't been sure if Raylan would really give a shit what was in his mind anymore, but he was making it pretty clear with these questions that he very much did. Boyd knew it was stupid for him to want Raylan to give a shit, but it didn't seem like he could control that part of his mind. Not with Raylan sitting across from him, drinking 'shine and looking at him with eyes that still practically talked out loud just like they used to.

Their history was this huge, heavy thing sitting there in between them. Boyd knew that there was no way Raylan wasn't just as aware of it as he was, and he idly wondered what would happen if he were to acknowledge it. He thought Raylan would probably just tell him to shut up, and he might say some hurtful things that Boyd surely did not want to hear right now.

When Raylan had left, Boyd sat and drank for a long time, not letting anyone else near him. He didn't know what to do about Raylan being here, as a U.S. Marshal of all things. He felt like this could only end badly, very badly, for one or both of them.

He remembered this thought the night he'd goaded Raylan into shooting him. It had ended badly, for Boyd, and probably for Raylan too. He could see the tears in Raylan's eyes as he knelt over him. He could hear the pain in his voice as he said, "We dug coal together when we were 19." He knew what was Raylan was really saying, what he couldn't say, and Boyd felt nothing but a crushing sense of loss and regret before losing consciousness entirely.

Raylan had come to see him in the hospital, of course. The relief and guilt were plain to see on his face, which looked more beautiful to Boyd at that moment than it ever had. He could still hardly believe Raylan was here, standing next to his hospital bed, touching his bandage lightly, putting his hand over Boyd's fingers.

"Why didn't you kill me?"

"I shot a gun right at your heart, what more did you want?"

"Raylan, you've killed how many people? You were sitting right across the table from me, so why ain't I dead?"

"I guess that's really what you wanted, then? To die by my hand? How could you do that to me, Boyd? You had to know how that would... why did it have to be me?"

"I let you go twenty years ago, Raylan. All I was asking for was the same favor from you."

Raylan choked a little, rubbed his face, and when he spoke, his eyes were wide with anger and disbelief. "That's bullshit, Boyd, and you know it. It ain't the same thing by any stretch, so don't even try. And anyway, you let me go? That's what you think? You kept me here, Boyd. As long as you were here, I never left."

"You went off, joined the Marshals, got _married_ ," and Boyd poured a bit of scorn into this last. "You want to stand there and tell me that I somehow kept some kind of hold over you because I didn't run off and set up house somewhere with you? Fine. I'll take it. I won't feel sorry for that, and you shouldn't ask me to."

"Yeah, I got married. Sure, I did. It didn't work out, and you know why? You think it's because she's a woman, but you're wrong about that. Men or women, it doesn't really make a whole lot of difference for me. That's hard for almost everyone to understand, and I know it, but that's how it is for me. I chose women mostly, yeah, because there's less bullshit involved around other people. Because it didn't matter - I could have dated a dozen boys, two dozen, and it would have been just the same as it was with Winona, because it was never about that for me. It was about you, Boyd, always about you. So, ok, I don't expect you to feel sorry for me. Just... shit. I don't know what else to say about it."

Boyd suddenly felt more tired than he ever had, and his chest hurt, so he closed his eyes and pushed the button for more painkillers. He couldn't talk anymore, about this or anything else. Before Raylan left, he placed a perfunctory kiss on Boyd's forehead, but didn't say anything more.

When Boyd got out of prison, Raylan was there to collect him, as Boyd knew he would be. He knew that Raylan didn't know what to make of his sudden religious conversion, and in some ways Boyd wasn't sure what he meant by it either. He did have a burning desire to change his life, and to stop hurting people with everything he did, and being who he was and where he came from, this was the only way he knew to go about it. He wanted to help people now, and he kept the swastika on his arm covered up at all times. One day he'd have to get it burned off - not because he couldn't face it for himself, but because he knew it hurt people to see it, and gave them the wrong idea of who he was. He hadn't been that person before either, but he had been the kind of person who didn't care one way or another. He knew exactly why he suddenly cared what people thought, and it had nothing to do with his near-death experience or anything else except Raylan Givens.

Later, after his men had been slaughtered and everything had gone to shit, it was no surprise to Boyd that the only person he had to go to was Raylan. He didn't care about anything that had gone on with Ava and Raylan, or Raylan's ex-wife. None of that mattered, because he wasn't looking for anything from Raylan but some kind of comfort, some kind of understanding.

Raylan looked angry when he first opened the door to his hotel room and saw Boyd standing there. Boyd was so obviously broken, and when he said in a near-whisper, "I'm lost, Raylan," his expression softened. Boyd knew what Raylan was thinking about, that first night when Raylan had been so brave and everything had changed between them forever. Raylan had pulled him into a hug and held him for half a minute or so, and when he let go, Boyd had felt how hard it had been for him. It was an impossible situation, but Boyd was too far gone to even try to sort any of that out. He just wanted to be near Raylan, and let him help if he could.

At the end of that terrible day, Boyd said, "I'm betting on you being the only friend I have left in this world," and he knew that what he was really gambling on was whatever love Raylan had left for him. He felt like it was a gamble worth taking, and if he lost, he was prepared to die if he had to. He didn't want that anymore, not like he had, even though he felt emptier than he could ever remember feeling.


	6. We Belong Here, We Belong Here, Ain't Nobody That Can Tell Us We're Wrong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Raylan needs Boyd to make him feel better. Boyd does.

Raylan Givens was wrecked. Nothing in his life thus far had prepared him for what he had witnessed that afternoon. Mags Bennett had seemed to Raylan, always, to be both an immutable force and an unmovable object. She was power and utter calm. She was the dynamite and the mountain. She was of Kentucky, in a way that someone from away would never understand. For her to go that way, in front of him, by her own hand… well. It made sense, but it was almost unbearable to witness.

Raylan had killed many people in the course of his career, and had sustained some inevitable damage to his soul from that. He knew this to be true, but it was not something he spared much thought for. He had been damaged years before he started killing people, and he knew well how to live with that. He had long taken pride in what he had managed to become, how he had learned to live his life, despite this damage- that is, when he could be bothered to think of it. Mostly he just lived from day to day, doing what needed to be done in that moment, for the people in his life. He did these things for the people he cared about, for those he saw as too weak to do for their own selves, and- though most of the time he might deny it, for the one person whose soul mirrored his own in its wounds and its pain, and also in its remarkable durability. That person was the only one Raylan could imagine being near right now.

Many hours passed before Raylan was able to get away. He had told his version of the day’s events (somewhat selectively, to be sure) many times, and had become numbed to the facts. But the facts weren’t the issue anyway. It was this one thought, this one thing he could not get his mind around. No one would ever make Mags’ apple pie again. It had been handed down to no one. It was one more thing, one of the things that meant home like none other, that was now lost- and not just to him, either. It was lost to the world, a part of history, just like the rest of the life that Mags had loved in that holler. Everyone had been furious with her, making pretty speeches about preserving their way of life and then selling that life out to for her family’s own gain. It had been the ultimate betrayal, there’s no way around it, but Mags had been a pragmatist. She knew that world was gone, that life was at an end. And that, as much beauty as there was in it, there had always been more suffering.

Raylan pulled up in front of Ava’s at around 11 that night, killed the engine and walked toward the porch. As he approached, he saw Ava sitting on the step, smoking a cigarette.

“Thought you were quittin’. Gonna live clean for awhile.”

Ava took a slow draw on her smoke and gazed calmly at Raylan. “Don’t seem to be much of a point to it anymore, really. Seems like no one lives long enough to get cancer here in Harlan anyway.” She ground the cigarette out in the ashtray next to her on the step, and stood. “You come for me, Raylan? Or is it Boyd you’re lookin’ for?”

“Ava… I’m sorry, I need to see Boyd. He around?”

“He ain’t here. He wasn’t here when I got home, and I don’t know where he would have gone. What do you want with him anyway?”  


“Nothin’ to worry about, Ava. Personal business.”

“Raylan Givens, you think I’m stupid or somethin’? I know what kind of personal business you’re after. I wondered about it ever since you and I first got together, and when I was with Boyd, it all made a hell of a lot of sense. That man hurts, Raylan. He’s belonged to someone he couldn't have for the last twenty years. What do you think that does to a man? Or maybe you know just what it does. So I’m askin’ you Raylan, what do you want with him? Because please, don’t do anything that’s going to make it worse. Don’t go find him if you’re just looking for a distraction to get your mind off that nightmare this afternoon.”

“Ava. I’m not really sure what you’re talking about, but I need to find Boyd. Where would he go?”

Ava sighed and lit another cigarette. “Well, I’m sure I don’t know, but I imagine you’ll think of something. You know him better than I do anyway.”

Raylan didn't know if Boyd wanted to see him tonight. He'd probably be pretty mad at Raylan for taking Dickie away from him. He had felt bad about that, truly - Boyd had saved Raylan's life, and had been well within his rights to expect something in return. Still, he figured their accounts were more or less in balance, even if Boyd didn't see it that way. He and Boyd had been doing their own things since Raylan had been back around Harlan, but never without a sharp awareness of the other's place in those doings. The remains of their old bond were still kicking around between them, and this hadn't been without consequence in how things went down.

Raylan hadn’t let himself think too much about his current feelings for Boyd. After unburdening himself to Boyd in the hospital, what felt like a lifetime ago, he had kept everything under wraps as much as possible. Since being back in Harlan, Raylan had felt many things towards Boyd – anger, disappointment, grief, and an unsurprising tenderness. Raylan knew that was inevitable. He had loved Boyd, the boy, and he could still see him so clearly in the man. Whatever else that Raylan might be feeling when he looked at Boyd Crowder, well, that was something Raylan hadn’t particularly wanted to explore. The way Boyd smiled at him these days held a great deal of honesty, and this did surprise Raylan a bit. Boyd could lie when he wanted to, even to Raylan - he could hide a lot beneath that dead-eyed, toothy grin. But he chose to give him the real thing, and why was that?

Raylan headed out to the lake. He figured that if Boyd did want to see him, that's where he would be. He didn't know why he thought that, after all this time. Why this particular night would be any different, he couldn't say, but he knew it was. He thought Boyd would know how much Raylan needed him tonight.

Raylan drove down the familiar dirt path and when he saw the lake, he pulled off the side into some low bushes. It wasn't until he saw Boyd's truck that he realized he'd been holding his breath, and he let it out in a huff. He felt a little jolt of excitement in his stomach as he walked towards Boyd, who was sitting in the bed of his truck, under the moonlight.

“Why Marshal Givens, how nice of you to join me. Can I offer you a refreshment?” Boyd held the jar out as Raylan sat down next to him.

“Well, thanks Boyd. I believe I will take you up on that offer. It’s been a hell of a week.” Raylan tried his best not to wince as the shine burned its way down to his stomach, but judging from the look on Boyd’s face, he was not entirely successful.

“I surely wish that I could offer you something more to ease your sorrow, Raylan. I would do that, if I could.”

Raylan wasn’t sure what Boyd was saying. Whatever Ava thought, any physical intimacy between the two of them had been a very long time ago. And even then – though Raylan knew it couldn’t have been anything but love, really – they hadn’t been much of a comfort to each other. Or only occasionally, at least. Mostly, their relationship had been a source of stress for both of them, only feeling right when they were wrapped up in each other. Raylan looked down, and he noticed something he hadn't seen when he had first sat down next to Boyd. They were sitting on a blanket, and Raylan could have sworn it was the one he'd brought out to the lake that first night. He was staring at it, trying wrap his mind around what that meant, when Boyd spoke.

"Yeah, it's yours. I could never figure out what to do with it." Boyd looked at his knees. "I left it in my truck for a long time, shoved behind the seat. It hurt to look at it, but throwing it out was just too... well. I just couldn't bring myself to do it. And it's a pretty nice quilt, anyway. When I went into the Army, I put it in storage with my books and a few other things I didn't really trust to stay in one piece if I'd left them at my daddy's house. I remember thinking when I came back for it, it still smelled like you. Then I put it back in the truck and left it there, and when it broke down and I got another, I put it in that one too. I don't know, maybe I wanted to be sure I had it in case you showed up." Boyd snorted softly and shook his head.

“Boyd… I just want to sit here with you. I don’t want to talk about nothin’. Can we do that?”

“Raylan, you think I don’t know you or somethin’?” Boyd was grinning just a little bit. “You think I want you to make you open up about your feelings? I don’t need to do that.”

“You don’t, huh? You still think you know me, after all this time?” Raylan’s voice was quiet, and only the tiniest bit shaky, toward the end.

Boyd sighed, and cast a sidelong glance at Raylan’s profile. His eyes were closed, and the cheek he could see was suspiciously wet. That seemed to make the decision for him. Boyd reached up and put his arm around Raylan’s shoulders, and pulled him in to his chest. Raylan leaned into him silently for a few moments, and then his sobs began to shake both of them. Raylan couldn’t remember the last time he’d really cried, and it was a little bit frightening to him because not only was he unable to stop, but for the first time in his life, he didn’t even feel like he wanted to. It felt like something that had been coming for a very long time, and he knew he wasn’t just crying for Mags, or for Helen, but also for Boyd and himself, and everything they had all lost.

Raylan’s sobs tapered off slowly. He sat up, wiped his face on his sleeve, and took another pull from the jar. He took a deep breath and let out a huge, shuddering sigh. He still felt sad, but he no longer felt… filthy. He hadn’t even realized that was how he’d felt, but now that he felt so clean all of a sudden, it was obvious to him. He looked at Boyd, and it felt like there had been nothing, and no time, between now and the last time he had kissed Boyd Crowder. He was about to lean in and do that very thing - Boyd wouldn't object, he could see that clear as day, in the way his eyes were holding Raylan's and shining so brightly - but Boyd did it first. It was a quick kiss, little more than a peck, and when Boyd sat back he had a small smirk on his mouth, and his eyes held amusement and a hint of a challenge. He reminded Raylan of a little boy who had just just pulled some little girl's pigtails. It was ridiculous, and incongruous on a man who had lived the kind of life that Boyd had, but it looked right on him too. Raylan leaned in for another kiss, and this one was not quite so quick. It was slow and easy, but it went on, and on, and on. His right hand slid around to Boyd's slender back and up his neck, into his hair and latched on gently. Boyd's left hand slid to Raylan’s side, and as it did, Raylan made a sound that was not quite a moan, not quite a gasp, but which sounded like he had just remembered something very important. When the kiss finally broke, both of them were panting. Raylan rested his forehead on Boyd’s shoulder and his hand on Boyd’s thigh. He was feeling a bit overwhelmed, and all he knew – all he had ever known – to do with that state of affairs was to shut the hell up until it passed.

After what felt like a very long time, Raylan lifted his head and looked at Boyd. Boyd just smiled at him – that heartbreaking, true smile which Raylan now understood the meaning of.

“Raylan,” Boyd said in an almost-whisper. “It’s alright, Raylan.”

Raylan closed his eyes, trying his best to ward off the effects of hearing his name spoken so softly in Boyd’s voice. He had always loved the way Boyd Crowder said his name, the way it slid off his tongue like he’d been licking it.

“Oh well shit, Boyd. No it ain’t. None of what happened today is alright.”

“Except this. This always was the one thing that really was alright. I know you remember. That night, out here after my daddy beat the crap out of me? Raylan, I don’t even remember that beating, because all I ever could recall about that night was how you were with me. How you patched me up, and you showed me - "

“Boyd. C’mon now. Ancient history. What’s the point?”

Boyd put his hand over Raylan’s, where it still rested on top of Boyd’s leg. “This ain’t ancient history, Raylan. This is now. Now I can make you feel better, just like you did for me that night all that time ago.” He kissed Raylan softly, briefly.

“Ava told me to be careful with you, Boyd,” Raylan mumbled against his lips.

“What, she thought I was going to hurt you? Why would I do that?” Boyd brought his hand up to Raylan’s face and lightly stroked his jaw.

“Not careful of you, careful with you. And I know you heard me right the first time. She was afraid I would toy with you, disappoint you… again. She was right, Boyd. I don’t want to do that to you. You deserve better than that. Always did.” Raylan kissed him in earnest now, and his cheeks were wet again.

“So don’t disappoint me this time, Raylan.”

“I disappoint everyone, sooner or later. Can’t help myself, somehow.”

The tears were still streaming down Raylan’s face, but he decided to ignore them. They kissed again, and Raylan gently pushed Boyd back onto the blanket. Raylan was almost painfully hard, and he could feel that Boyd was in the same situation. Bracing himself with one leg, he slid the other one between Boyd’s thighs, and they stayed like that for awhile, kissing and rubbing at each other. After awhile, Boyd reached down and unzipped both of their jeans, and they pushed them down a bit, continuing to rub and slide together through their boxers. Raylan thought he could probably just come that way, dry humping like a kid. Like the kid he had been with Boyd all those years ago, though they had eventually done more than this. Much more, in fact, once, though that night held as much pain in Raylan's memory as pleasure. Part of him wanted to do keep doing just this, thought maybe it would make the whole thing less serious somehow, but he also knew that would be dishonest. It was serious, and Raylan knew it. This was already something, and nothing they did would make it more or less than it was. If they had never even touched each other, it would always be serious between him and Boyd, because they were connected.

Raylan moved back and pulled Boyd's pants and boxers the rest of the way down and wrapped his fingers around his achingly hard cock. Boyd closed his eyes and expelled a hard breath, then sucked it back in quickly as Raylan came up to lay flush against him, and began to move his hand slowly up and down.

“Raylan…could you...” Boyd reached up to kiss and suck on Raylan’s neck, trailing down to his shoulder and biting him lightly there. Raylan knew what he wanted, so he let go and moved down Boyd's body.

“It’s been a long time, Boyd. I might not be any good.” Raylan licked the length of him, then sucked lightly on the head. Boyd groaned.

“Please Raylan. Just do it. I've been waiting twenty years, and I can't take a second more.”

Raylan laughed a little wildly, then swallowed the full length of him at once, and Boyd shouted once, bucked hard, then stilled.

“Oh, it’s so… oh Raylan, I didn’t think… thought this was all done between us. This is… I can’t last, Raylan.”

Raylan pulled off and said, “Boyd, it’s alright. It’s alright, go ahead.” He took Boyd all the way in again, grasping his hips roughly, as Boyd’s hips strained forward and he pulsed into Raylan’s mouth.

Boyd’s hand was on the top of Raylan’s head, stroking the brown hair that was now streaked with gray. Boyd thought it was beautiful, that gray. He realized just then how much he loved that Raylan was a man, not a boy anymore. Raylan rested against Boyd's thigh for a moment, then crawled back up to lie next to him. Boyd reached down and lightly stroked his cock. Raylan's face made it obvious that he wasn't going to last long either. This had been a long time coming for both of them, and they needed to just get it done now.

“What do you want me to do, Raylan? What would you like?”

Raylan’s face was buried in Boyd’s neck, and he seemed to have lost control of his voice. He had never been a talker during sex, much like in the rest of his life, but he couldn’t seem to shut himself up now. Those emotions that he had tried so hard to master earlier were welling up again, and he couldn’t push them back down while his body was feeling so good.

“Oh, just… just this. More of this. Harder. Yeah, like that. Like that. Boyd, oh. Now, now… Now! Oh god, I love you. I love you, I do. Goddamn it. How do you like that, I still love Boyd Crowder after all this goddamn time.”

“I didn’t know you loved me back then, Raylan.”

“Sure you did, Boyd. It was me who was stupid enough not to realize. I didn’t figure that out until years after I left.”

“Better late than never, I guess.”

“I guess. When did you know you loved me?”

“Who said I ever did, Raylan Givens?”

“Boyd…”

Boyd grinned. “I’m sorry Raylan, I shouldn’t be messing with you after the day you’ve had. I loved you since… well, I don’t rightly know, Raylan. Since always, it seems like. Since you kissed me. Since you taped up my face. Since... I don't know, since the first day I met you, for all I know."

“Back then... that day in the mine? You had my hand the whole time, Boyd. You never let me go. I always wanted to be able to thank you for that. You saved my life that day.”

“I wasn’t about to lose you, Raylan.”

“But you lost me anyway, Boyd. I’m sorry for that. I’m so sorry.”

“Shit, Raylan. I didn’t lose you. Because look – here you are. We lost some time, is all.”

Raylan knew it was more complicated than that, and he knew that Boyd knew it too. Neither of them had any idea what this really was, or what it could possibly be here in Harlan. He didn’t want to think of that now though, because all he wanted at the moment was to get some sleep. And he wanted to get it while wrapped around Boyd, because he wasn’t about to lose him again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you guys got something out of this story. I would love feedback, notes, whatever.


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